Standing on the Edge of Forever
by Joriel
Summary: The reflections of a long life. It's kind of hard to describe this one for me.


I'm scared.  
  
The thought makes me laugh. All the years I've lived, everything I survived, and all the experiences that made me who I am today, and now I'm finally learning what it means to be scared. How often I was willing to die when I was younger. Now that I've lived a full and long life, now I'm afraid to die.  
  
I tell myself because it's the first time I haven't been in control of it. Every other time, if I died, it was a result of my own actions. My own choices. It wasn't like getting old, where none of it is a choice. It just happens, whether you want it to or not. I suppose I shouldn't complain though, I did managed to manipulate events and people to the ultimate goals I wanted. There have been no more wars since Dekkim Barton died. I think people are afraid. Ever since they found out the infamous Gundam Pilots were a bunch of untrained 15 year olds, with only really Heero and Myself having much of a military background, scant as it might have been. That scared people, as they looked at their children, and imagined them piloting the huge machines of destruction, risking their lives, and not even old enough to have graduated high school. Even the wealthy and politically important people paused and looked hard at their own children. The people who usually started the wars, feeling immune to their effects from the power of their money or position, realized it was a false immunity thanks to Quatre. And Duo made people realize the orphans had to be taken care of, shown love and self worth after his rampages and self proclaimed God of Death self-identity. These days there aren't any more cast away children, people take them in and raise them alongside their own. Wufei taught the scholar's the value of actual experience alongside book knowledge. Heero's life in the police departments; his influence on their training, skills, and methods made them all think twice before committing anything other than petty thefts for the most part.  
  
My own life oftentimes seems to me an extension of Duo's, just another war orphan who went to odd places. I suppose I am the one that the history books know the least about, despite my life in the cameras at Quatre's side. I'd always worked from the shadows, manipulating people into the results I desired rather than creating head on confrontations like Heero and Duo, or trying to teach people better like Quatre and Wufei. I liked it in the shadows, it felt safer there, no one looking at me, no one knowing that I had been cast away like so much trash, without even the benefit of a name. It was only through the purest accident that I discovered my dear friend Cathy Bloom was actually my sister. It had turned up on a test for compatibility when the car accident had destroyed my kidneys, and Quatre tested negatively.  
  
I had a full life of family and friends. Even raised a few children despite my lifetime partnership with Quatre, there were plenty of war orphans in need of homes, and they had taken several in. Sarah, their first, had followed her Aunt Iria's footsteps, and pursued medicine. She had Quatre's gentle manner and was much loved by all she met. Nathan had come to them next, badly scarred from a fire and had taken a long time to reach him. Used to rejection and disgust, the internal scars ran deeper than those on his body. It was his older sister that had finally broken the ice and brought him fully into the family. A series of surgeries removed the worst of the scarring and improved his self-esteem, and Nathan had grown into a quiet, serious young man who took up counseling for a living. Quatre had been concerned, but Nathan had Trowa's gift of quiet listening which enabled him to do wonders. Alex was a bright bundle of energy from the moment he came to them, never staying still for a moment, and had taken up a career in gymnastics. He never quite made the gold medal, but he did very well, and had become an excellent coach for other kids. And lastly was Rain, their youngest. Rain had gone into education, her cheerful and patient nature serving her well. He had more grand kids now than his tired old mind could remember, but he loved every one of them just the same.  
  
The world would go on just fine without him. He'd done his part, and now he was standing at the edge of forever, trying to look over in the murky abyss. And he had to face the real cause of his fears. What if they weren't there?  
  
Duo had been the first to go, his brilliant life stolen away piece by piece from an invader inside of his own body. They others could only watch helplessly as Duo slipped away from them despite Sarah Barton-Winner's best attempts. The cancer just wouldn't answer to her gentle touch. Heero had been stoic, doing his best to support Duo throughout the ordeal, trying to keep his lover's spirits up. But Nathan said that Heero had started showing up at his office, to break down, to get advice, to just help him survive losing Duo. Duo was only 54 years old, too young it seemed after everything they had lived through. The buried Duo on a quiet August afternoon, the day had been bright and hot and sunny, almost as if the earth itself were trying to give him tribute.  
  
Heero had followed him just a year later, despite Nathan's best efforts, Heero had found life without Duo unbearable, and swallowed his own gun. He'd done this with the same precision care he had done everything else, making sure that his body would be found while both their children were out of the country on vacations. Heero and Duo had chosen the surrogate route, and each had commissioned one child and raised them together. Duo's daughter had grown into a lovely young actress, while Heero's son had followed in his fathers footsteps and become a policeman. The survivors had gathered for his funeral, which would have surprised Heero, as it was every bit as big as Duo's. Relena had met his gaze with large, hollow eyes. She had begun to crack with Duo's death, and Heero's had widened it. The three had been almost inseparable best friends as they'd grown. Duo had even been Relena's "Man of Honor" at her wedding.  
  
Trowa often wondered if it hadn't been their deaths that had taken Relena along as well, inseparable even to death. Shortly after Heero was laid to rest, Relena and her husband Aaron and their children along with Milliardo and Noin Peacecraft and their children had boarded a plane to the Bahamas for a restful vacation. Aaron had confided in Quatre that Relena had overdone her work in the ambassador's office after Duo's death, desperately trying to work through her grief. After Heero's death, Aaron felt that she needed a rest before she headed right into a nervous breakdown. And then on the flight, the plane had been struck by lightning during a storm and the engines had failed. Of Relena's party, only her middle daughter had survived because she's been in the bathroom when the plane fell and too frightened to go out and back to her seat. The bodies were recovered, and laid to rest next to Heero and Duo.  
  
They'd had a good fifteen years then until Sally fell ill with Pneumonia, and they lost her. Une went next of a heart attack in her sleep, but they assured her family that she'd felt no pain. Two years later, Cathy confided in Trowa that she had cancer, and he'd felt such anger. Cancer had stolen Duo from him, and now his sister? It had hurt to watch her decline as helplessly as he'd watched Duo's, but he tried to be like Heero and be strong for her. She died four years later.  
  
Another year passed, and Wufei was gone, struck down by a drunk driver while crossing the street one day. The driver almost hadn't lived, he'd said to Heero's son Nick that he didn't see why he had to go to jail, all he'd done was get rid of one more parasite to social security, a useless old man.  
  
Just after their 80th birthday, Trowa lost his beloved Quatre to old age. Their children had gathered around him, no doubt in fear of a reaction similar to Heero's. Trowa had just cried out his grief in private, and tried to find things to enjoy living for. He knew that Quatre didn't want him to waste even a moment of his life. So he honored his beloved in death as he did in life, and just kept going.  
  
And now here he was, staring into the void that they had all looked into. And he couldn't see them. And he was terrified that they weren't there, that life was all there was, then you die and it's over. It was the thought that they would be lost with his death, that he would never actually see them again that terrified him. And as he grew closer and closer, the fear grew. He knew it was almost over, he could feel his body shutting down around him. He spent his days thinking about the lost ones, and very little time thinking about the hear and now.  
  
"Hey, Trowa, what are you worrying for so much? It's not so bad, ya know. The dying, and then you get to be with us."  
  
The voice was amazing familiar despite the fact that he hadn't heard it in almost thirty years. Slightly raspy and upbeat, and violet eyes lowered to meet his. With a start, he realized he could see through the face that was looking at his.  
  
"D...Duo?"  
  
"Who else could have hair like this?" Duo asked, flipping his phantom braid over his shoulder. "I came to tell you it's going to be okay, that we are waiting for you. Quatre said you needed to know, that you couldn't let go until you did."  
  
Trowa smiled then, his heart suddenly at ease. Duo had always had that way about him, and a penchant for just telling the truth. It really would be okay. When he looked up again, the phantom was gone, but his heart knew it's friend.  
  
That night, he called all his children and grandchildren, told them how much he loved them, and went to sleep.  
  
Trowa let go. And when he opened his eyes again, they were all there, around him. Everyone that had left him in life was taking turns hugging him, until he was alone with Quatre, and realized they were both young again. And together, forever this time. He caught a flash of smiling violet eyes and Duo waved and rounded a corner to give them privacy.  
  
"So this is peace," Trowa said, smiling at Quatre, who smiled back. It was good to be inside, instead of on the edge. 


End file.
